Security Measures
by Zoliel
Summary: This story takes place just after the Apocalypse-That-Wasn't. Crowley has (what Aziraphale initially thinks is) a brush with death, causing the angel to confess some things he's been putting off saying.
1. After the End

"Take a look around if you like, seeing as you're making a habit of staying here."

Aziraphale could hear the wink at the end of Crowley's statement, even if his back was turned as he headed down the apartment's hall. For once, Crowley had adopted an attitude of nonchalance and Aziraphale was grateful. He wasn't even quite sure how he had ended up here instead of the bookshop, but thankfully, Crowley didn't even seem to mind. The truth was that after everything that had happened, Aziraphale just really needed to be somewhere sure and solid for a moment; somewhere that he felt safe. Apparently, feeling safe meant being around Crowley.

_How very telling_, chided one side of his brain. The other side responded with an internal glare, rather pained but also well rehearsed.

Crowley continued on of course, blissfully oblivious.

"I have some cleaning up to do. Holy water," the demon called as he slipped from the hallway to another room.

Aziraphale looked up suddenly, halting his meandering route towards what he assumed was the apartment's central room.

"I should really get that for you. After diverting a whole apocalypse, being taken out by a puddle would be..." the angel trailed off. Crowley kept up his swaggering pace, not even turning around to reply.

"If you wouldn't mind."

It only took a snap of Aziraphale's fingers to dispel the bit of Heaven leaking across the tile floor. Crowley still gave the place where it once was a wide berth, Aziraphale noted, before he wandered off into another room. Crowley was trying not to show it, but he was actually quite exhausted. Anyone, even a demon, quite reasonably would be following the last few days' events. After the not-quite-apocalypse, the trials, and ten years' worth of stress over making sure that everything went according to plan; it was not so much a question of whether or not Crowley would pass out, but instead when.

Meanwhile, Aziraphale was turning in a full circle, surveying the flat's main room. It was strange that he had only been to this apartment once before, but the high-arching and darkly colored walls as well as the generally dramatic ambiance made it feel familiar already. The place really did just have "Crowley" written all over it in a sort of glittery red looping script. He could already have told you that last night, which was the previously insinuated first time he had visited Crowley's apartment.

As it had turned out, by the time the pair had made it back last night it was already quite late and they had spent their entire time there trying to sort out the rather delicate matter of safely exchanging faces. (Angel, demon, not wanting to explode, all that jazz). There had also been quite a bit of planning to be done, as well as a short time spent practicing just to make sure that they really could believably pass as each other. Despite the aura of "life-and-death situation" hanging in the air, the two of them had still found that last bit quite amusing.

Nevertheless, they had spent the hours from near midnight til dawn in the smallish room filled with ancient texts Crowley never bothered to read (which was just off the main hall, hence the holy water still left in the office).

_Could you call it an office? _Aziraphale wondered. _A study? A studio? A living-space leaning towards atelier? _Whatever the proper word was for the room with the throne.

Aziraphale continued to glance about the place, surprised at how much he actually liked the interior design choices, different as they were from his own. Maybe he would take just a little peak around before... well, what was he supposed to do? Sleep? That wasn't really Aziraphale's style, but he might give it a go.

Finally, his eye caught on something peaking through a door left slightly ajar. Something green...

"Ah, the plants!" He said aloud, his face lighting up. "I've heard so many stories but I've never actually seen them." Crowley's voice echoed through the flat even as Aziraphale crept through the doorway.

"Now don't you go coddling them!"

The words were laced with humor, but all the same, Aziraphale knew better than to tamper with a single stalk, stamen, or stem.

The room seemed to swell as Aziraphale entered, walls, ceiling, vines, and leaves inhaling as one entity. He gazed upwards at the deep green canopy above him and took a long, peaceful breath. It seemed to Aziraphale, just for a moment, as if the verdure surrounding him had let out a sigh of relief right along with him. The whole place just felt so passively alive. Perhaps he would procure a few plants for the shop, Aziraphale thought to himself. He knew Crowley would like that, and for some reason that thought became quite wedged in the background noise of Aziraphale's brain, try as he might to focus instead on the ornamental greenery. What he did not know was that, just a few rooms over, Crowley was facing a rather similar problem.

The demon had been attempting to tidy up after quite a few hectic days spent dealing with Armageddon, but a series of thoughts were stuck on repeat, echoing round and round his ears.

_Last time, Aziraphale coming over here was a necessity._

Crowley waved a hand in the vague direction of the table and his favorite green plant mister reappeared on its surface.

_He's gotten the shop back. Doesn't he have books to attend to?_

Somehow his globe had ended up on the floor, so he propped it back up. And of course, the new mister didn't have any water in it.

_Not that I mind in the slightest, but surely he would never pick me over a freshly remade bookshop, not even for one eveni- shutupshutupshutup_

Crowley could have just made some water appear, but he needed something to do. He drifted down to the bathroom just off the bedroom.

_Stop thinking about... just no. We're both safe here and that's what's important. Right?_

Water spilled into the sink before catching the mister's plastic rim. Shaking hands.

_Right!? _

_Honestly, if the forces of Heaven and Hell came knocking, would we even have a chance? _

_Have I even locked the door?_

Crowley tried to remain calm.

_Of course I have._

He slowly paced back into the bedroom.

_Haven't._

Crowley set the mister aside before falling heavily against the edge of the bed and trying in vain to collect his fatigued thoughts.

_I have most definitely locked that door, _ he reassured himself for a final time.

_Probably._

He let his head drop into his hands as it became evident that all of the not-so-nice happenings of late had gotten to him more than he had realized. He squinted his eyes shut behind the dark glasses, deciding that trying to think of absolute nothingness would be easier than trying to keep actual thoughts in order.

Despite this valiant attempt, ever so slowly, something else began to rise to the surface in Crowley's sleep-deprived mind.

_Wait, wasn't there something else pertaining to Hell I was supposed to remem-_

A few rooms over, Aziraphale startled at the sound of a yell cut short from elsewhere in the apartment, his index finger mere millimeters from a particularly elegantly poised palm frond.

_Could Crowley really tell from that far away that I had... what had he said... "coddled" a plant?_

The thought flashed through Aziraphale's mind, but he had already turned on one heal and fled back towards the location of the sound. That had not been a sound of frustration over a potted plant. That had been a sound of anguish.

The whole flat was now eerily silent, but that only served to brighten the horrific pictures dancing before Aziraphale's eyes. He had know that the people Upstairs or Downstairs might catch on eventually, but this was so soon!

"Crowley?" He called, the darkness in every corner sewn by the growing night only worsening his panic. No response.

Aziraphale dashed through a few open doorways, having the luck to promptly happen upon the bedroom.

"Crowley!"

The demon was lying motionless on the floor, pressed to the carpet by the dark weight only supplied by unconsciousness. Aziraphale dropped to his knees, taking care not to crush Crowley's sunglasses which had been thrown askew. Slit-pupiled eyes rested unfocused behind half-closed eyelids.

This was very, very bad.

Aziraphale reached for Crowley's arm, clutched his wrist, and found no pulse.

_Do demons even have pulses?_

Try as he might to stay calm, Aziraphale could almost taste the panic setting in.

He yelled Crowley's name again. Nothing.

Aziraphale's speech turned garbled before he finally managed to cry out,

"What have they done to you?"


	2. Heartbeat Eve

Of the numerous times his own name had been called, Crowley had registered only sounds, meaningless consonants and vowels. Just a moment ago, he could have sworn that whoever was nearest to him... must be Aziraphale... really was just making sounds; choked, distraught, horrible sounds. Why was his angel so upset? What was going on? At last, one sentence managed cut through the staticky, disorienting haze.

"What have they done to you?"

Aziraphale's voice was so filled with utter despair that Crowley could feel it ripple through him even in this... wherever he was. Where was he, anyway? It was an odd weightless sort of place, a mesh of sounds and all pitch black, and- Crowley opened his eyes. He was in the air, not flying, although his wings were partially extended... but everything felt a bit scrambled and he was finding it rather difficult to ascertain whether he had any wings or any _anything_, for that matter, at all.

A few choice expletives ran through his mind, due to the fact that Crowley hadn't felt quite this disembodied in a great long while. His eyes (_Good_, he thought, _still got eyes_) went out of focus, then back in. He was positioned in such a way that he was facing a familiarly carpeted floor... A good six feet up above... was that a body?

Hell, Earth, and Heaven! Crowley was looking down at his own body, crumpled on the ground! Everything was smudging together and turning colors, but he could just maybe make out Aziraphale's outline, hunched beside the vessel Crowley used to navigate Earth. It would be a shame if something were to happen to that vessel, he had quite liked the hair...

_No! Focus!_ He scolded himself.

He tried to call out to Aziraphale, and the syllables managed to pass his lips- always a good sign; but the kneeling angel paid no heed- not as good a sign. In fact, he would classify it as _extremely_ not as good.

Aziraphale was speaking too, but whatever words were being spoken were coming in and out of focus just like Crowley's vision. From what he could make out, Aziraphale appeared to be going into hysterics, which was a rare and extremely off-putting sight for Crowley. On top of that, he felt like his mind was being tied in knots. Crowley was really trying very hard to concentrate, but he kept hearing frantically uttered fragments of sentences being tuned in and out like radio frequencies.

"...Waited... should have... Hell..."

_Am I dead?_ He wondered. He didn't feel dead. _Is that even allowed for demons?_

"…don't understand… happen when…"

_Have I somehow been... oh, I don't know, stripped of my demonic powers?_ He raised the question to no one in particular, then answered it for himself. _No, no, that would certainly hurt, and this doesn't hurt exactly, it just feels very... wishy washy..._

Aziraphale's warped voice continually rose to audibility, becoming incredibly loud one moment and then easing off, only to do it all over again. Crowley, amidst all the panic, tried once more to call out for him, though he only received the spotty one-sided dialogue in return. One statement echoed a few times, more painful with every contorted repetition.

"You can't leave me!" cried the angel, before letting out a strangled sob like before.

Crowley's body, or lack thereof, was beginning to burn, and his next words were just as much a plea for help as a consolation to his despairing friend below.

"Angel, I'm here!"

These words seemed to ring out with more force than those spoken before, and just might have done the trick. Aziraphale paused for a moment, before hesitantly raising his head; his shuddering voice fading in for a final time. Something within him seemed to resolve, and there was no hesitation in his eyes as he exclaimed, "Crowley, I have always loved y-"

A few things happened in quick succession then.

First, Aziraphale's sentence splintered off like dry kindling. His intentions, however, were quite clean-cut.

Naturally, the next event to follow was Crowley's heart skipping a beat.

He decided right then and there that it was the best feeling in the world.

Quite soon after that, Aziraphale screamed, conjuring up the sound of terror incarnate; all the while gazing right up into the demon's eyes.

Finally Crowley, still reeling with the shock of both Aziraphale's words and look of horror, was bludgeoned with the sensation of plummeting into ice water. There was just enough time to think,

_Now that hurt like getting hit by a f-_

Before he blacked out completely.

—

Some time later, Crowley's eyes snapped open but he was more disoriented than ever. He couldn't recognize where he was, despite the fact that something inside him was adamant that he really should.

_Was this the year 1522? _

_It felt like 1522. _

There had been quite a bit of shouting in 1522. Someone was shouting just now, so it seemed a logical conclusion to come to. With all of that shouting going on, he definitely should have been paying attention, but he was much too busy scrambling in a panicked fashion using arms, legs, and a pair of wings; all six limbs beating rather uselessly against the ground. His gaze darted.

Bed- his?

Table- definitely his table.

Wall

Ceiling

Wall- a lot of walls here

_ANGEL!_

Oh, it was Aziraphale shouting! And he was still going, too; standing near the corner of the room, probably having leapt up amidst the wing-flapping. Panic was drawn across every angle of his face, and his eyes looked bloodshot- had he been crying?

Finally, after what he realized was the equivalent of millennia considering how obvious the answer was, a realization dawned on Crowley.

"Oh. OH! So ssssorry to st-spook you like that, angel!" Crowley slurred, honestly trying his absolute hardest to enunciate although things obviously weren't booted up all the way just yet.

"Sebruri- Set- security measures! Down in Hell! Tried to make sssure I would...n't make it back down there to mmess things up after that holy water fiasco!"

He tried to wink but instead ended up swatting a lamp off of his nightstand. He'd fix that later.

"Problem is, sometimes makes ya... makes you lose contact with your 'earthly vessel' for just a sssec."

Crowley didn't even attempt the air quotes for "earthly vessel", despite them being Beelzebub's words from a couple hundred years ago rather than his own.

Aziraphale's jaw had long since dropped open ("just a smidgeon", as he would have put it) and his eyes continued to dart as he attempted to collect his thoughts.

Finally, he ventured,

"But you... Crowley, you were dead!"

Aziraphale looked near tears (if he hadn't already passed under that threshold), and Crowley noted it.

Crowley's natural manner of existing included a biting joke whenever he could fit one in and several metric tons more sarcasm than necessary, but he dropped it down a notch so as to not seem quite so insensitive. Or insane. Either way.

He tried again to clarify.

"Well, it's all good now." He followed the statement up with discombobulated jazz hands before continuing.

"S'like... Here's what it's like- discorporation without destroying your body is what it's like." He looked up at Aziraphale, but only received a hesitant nod in return.

"It's something to do with the fact that you've got to kind of disssconnect from your body to get to Hell. Or Heaven also, actually. They just don't want me getting back there. I was right here the whole time! I sswear!" Crowley tried to readjust himself to a more comfortable sitting position, as the leftover dregs of dizziness suggested that standing was not a suitable option. His legs just sort of flailed, but at least he had enough control to avoid the sharp edges of furniture. When he looked back up, Aziraphale had gone nearly pale enough to match his coat.

"All that smoke and feathers and scales was you?" He let out an exasperated sound that wasn't really fitting of the title of a laugh.

"Good Lord, it's been so long since I saw you out of your body; I thought you were being attacked," he said, finally allowing a slight release in his panic-tensed posture.

To be fair, when a being such as Crowley is in their natural form out in the ordinary world, they tend to sort of cloud all five senses of their unfortunate beholder. Occult beings in their most basic state are often more "experience" than "entity". Had Aziraphale not been an angel himself, he likely would not have been able to identify much at all about our friendly neighborhood malicious gummy worm in dark glasses. However, as I was saying, the realization that the only thing within a thousand miles of being considered a threat present was Crowley seemed to put Aziraphale at ease. All seemed well until the angel's face managed to further drain of color despite something that looked remarkably like a blush creeping up his cheeks as well.

"And you were there... and of course _coherent_... the er... whole time?" His voice quaked on the last word, just the slightest bit.

_I have always loved-_ rang in Crowley's ears, causing his stomach to perform a single neat pirouette.

_Think fast, Crowley!_

"Well... I missed pretty much all of what you said... assuming that was you speaking?" he lied, although a bit unsure of why.

_Say something, say something!_

"You still look a bit shaken up, though. Are you alright?" He asked, peering up at the angel through late night heavy-lidded eyes.

The light from the washroom was silhouetting the upper half of Aziraphale's form, causing two things to occur. First of all, Crowley couldn't help but notice Aziraphale was looking rather more angelic even than usual, all rimmed in gold and such. Crowley could have even sworn that his eyes were faintly glowing the most incredible shade of grey-blue. A piece of him was loudly shushing the rest of him every time it crossed his mind.

More importantly, Crowley could not tell by Aziraphale's harshly shadowed face whether or not he had seen through the lie. After several painstaking seconds, Aziraphale smiled, although it was tiny.

"Am _I _alright?" he countered with a nervous chuckle. "I should be asking you!" Aziraphale took a step towards Crowley and held out a hand.

"Here, fold your wings in so I can actually reach you."

One heartbeat of lag time, then black feathers disappeared into pools of shadow. Aziraphale looked him over for several minutes, probably sensing in an angelic sort of way more than actually looking, but for occult beings (_ethereal!_ Aziraphale would have protested, had he been privy to the internal monologue), it was all rather the same. Eventually, he seemed to conclude that nothing was terribly amiss about the demon. It seemed that truly all that had changed was that it would be quite a bit more difficult for Crowley to find his way into Hell, and considering how tremendously bad it would be if he were to find himself back there, can I hear a wahoo?

However, in the end and after all of the evening's excitement, both angel and demon ended up falling asleep on the bedroom floor side by side, drifting off in moments. Somewhere at the back of their minds, they were both fretting over what had been said and when, if ever, it would be addressed. Six words hung in the air unspoken-

"Sort it out in the morning."


	3. Parallel Days

"I do hope I'm not overstaying my welcome." Aziraphale fussed awkwardly with the handle of his mug for a moment before placing it down on the table.

Crowley was still pacing the kitchen with his own mug of tea, which Aziraphale was sure he hadn't taken a single sip of. At least he seemed to have regained ordinary levels of both physical and vocal articulation after the prior evening.

"No, no, of course not," Crowley replied, completely glossing over the fact that he had never exactly invited Aziraphale over. After having such a lovely time dining at the Ritz, they had just sort of walked, and talked, and drove, and then talked some more until eventually they were both stood on Crowley's doorstep. It was rather late for one of them to just go wandering off in the vague direction of a bookshop, they had both weakly reasoned at the time.

"Plus," the demon continued, circling the slate grey kitchen island yet again, "I'm pretty glad that you were here now that we know what went down." He managed a half-smirk half-grin before going right back to pensive.

"That same thing hasn't happened to you, has it?" Aziraphale shook his head. Crowley merely shrugged and muttered something about how being "disowned" by both Heaven and Hell probably wasn't the best for the connection between his consciousness and vessel.

"Just don't go doing it again," Aziraphale mock-scolded, wearing a hesitant smile.

"You had me confessing everything I would have, had something really, truly happened to you..." he finished the sentence, but still left it sounding unfinished. Words unspoken hung in the air, like lures suspended by fishing line. Aziraphale feared that if he stuck around much longer, he would bump into a few too many and say something he really didn't mean to.

"Ah, well, look at the time!" He chuckled, glancing down at a watch-less wrist. "Things to do at the shop, you know."

He smoothed his sleep-wrinkled collar and slid off of his kitchen stool perch.

"Right, of course, things to do at the shop," Crowley echoed.

And then he was off.

—

There was a rather sizable stack of books that Aziraphale kept in one of the rooms above his store. This stack of books was also rather sizably shameful, in Aziraphale's opinion at least, for the sole reason that all of those books had been in his possession for at least seventy years, yet he had never quite gotten around to reading a single one.

He was well acquainted with each of the intricately collected books in the pile, to the point that he might even have considered them inanimate old friends. He cared about them, but it was just that there had just been so many other literarily appetizing series', and rich volumes that seemed far less emotionally taxing than those contained in the stack, and scrumptious little novellas that he adored using as an excuse for putting off just about anything. With so many other things to read that one might use to distract themselves, seventy-odd years, or even a hundred, or longer, really wasn't much time at all.

I know, you know, and Aziraphale certainly knows that this heap of books is rapidly becoming somewhat of an analogy.

As he swung open the door to his shop, the bell jingling merrily overhead, the stack of books in the upstairs room was on Aziraphale's mind. He couldn't help wondering if they would all still be there, even after the worldwide 'ctrl+alt+delete'. Deep down, he knew without a doubt that every last one would be intact down to their un-cracked spines, but it couldn't hurt to check. He made his way slowly throughout the entire downstairs first, finding fond memories draped over the backs of chairs and new additions to the carefully curated book menagerie lined up on knickknack shelves. Soft fingertips trailed their way over comfortably dusty mantles, journals, and hardcovers, lingering longer on favored volumes but always ultimately succumbing to the eventuality waiting upstairs.

Aziraphale's head hung just slightly as he ascended the steps some time later, coming to the realization that if his shop had truly burned down for good, not one of the poor books in the stack would have ever experienced the joy of being read. Aziraphale rounded the corner at the top of the stairwell, trying to shake the feeling that the knowledge of this near-tragedy left him with. His hand found the door's cold brass knob, a single dent in its side fitting the curve of his tensed ring finger.

He took a breath.

Twisted the knob.

And strode into the room.

Before any minuscule change of heart could set him off course, Aziraphale snatched up the book at the top of the pile, unceremoniously flipped open the cover and read the first sentence, delicately assisting every sound in ringing out into the air as he would, had he been plucking the strings of a harp. This particular book happened to be a copy of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit, and although Aziraphale found the first sentence to be excellently satisfying considering the book's highly regarded status, the actual content of the story is not entirely important at this _exact_ moment. The important part is that now that he had finally made his intentions clear of pursuing this and the several other volumes surrounding him, there really wasn't much of an option of turning back.

Of course, some people might be perfectly content to leave a book unfinished, perched on an end table with a scrap of paper eternally wedged in at page 163.

Aziraphale is no such person.

It might take months, or it might take years, but Aziraphale will always ensure that he someday sees every book, once started, through to its end. By the looks of things, he was going to want to be continuing on in this particular book sooner rather than later.

Just as the first sentence of a book that had spent far too long being ignored had finally been read aloud, Aziraphale had finally confessed to Crowley that he felt something for him that extended off of friendship and was steadily blooming into something running parallel but also entirely new. Crowley may have been a good liar, but nothing got past his angel. Aziraphale was quite certain the demon had heard those long awaited words; "I have always loved you".

Sunlight streamed in from the small room's only window, brightening the blue jay hue of the table upon which several blissfully untouched literary works sat, while also illuminating a crisp page number 1. Aziraphale gazed upwards and away from the book he clutched in both hands, as his face took on a smile that should most definitely be attributed to a great many things including, but also reaching far beyond, an epic tale of hobbits, dwarves, and dragons.

—

Meanwhile-ish, Crowley was taking part in a rather different method of addressing his emotions.

You see, there is a certain amount of concentration required in order to properly intimidate a plant. Crowley had, over the course of several years, perfected his ability to efficiently strike terror into the heart of any artichoke shrub, or whip even the most rebellious star fruit tree into shape. However, he had rapidly come to the conclusion that this process would, in fact, only work if he had at least 60% focus. The plants were growing particularly defiantly this afternoon, but at this exact moment, Crowley was barley sustaining 25%. He was ailed by an off-handed sort of distraction that he had often found creeping up behind him, so slowly that once it was discovered he was already firmly within its clutches, every time without fail.

Today, a day or so after Crowley's unfortunate sort-of-discorporation, the distraction of choice was Aziraphale.

Crowley made yet another circuit of the plant room, dishing out halfhearted threats as he went. The demon was reasoning through a whole mess of things, from 'Apocalypse aftermath' to 'Zero entry into Hell', but Aziraphale was there right at the center of it all. That particular distraction was a popular pick, especially of late.

He glowered down at his most troublesome maidenhair fern, but it barely offered up a fearful quiver.

It was just that Crowley had spent hundreds of years convincing himself that no matter how he felt about Aziraphale, and he certainly felt a lot of things, the angel wouldn't possibly ever reciprocate. He had told himself, time and time again, that he should be grateful to have Aziraphale even as a friend, when the chances of that happening were so low. And he _was_ grateful, but the territory had just become a bit difficult to navigate after the apocalypse had thrown Heaven's and Hell's rulebooks out the window. He rarely allowed any of this to rise to the forefront of his mind, but after what had been said...

Long standing walls were beginning to crumble.

Crowley looked down at the mister clutched in his left hand, only to realize that he had long since abandoned his task. The leaves around him drooped, insisting that there wasn't much to be done at this exact moment. He narrowed his eyes, but relented, sank to the floor and sat with his back to a very old pot containing a Palas palm. He slid his glasses down off of his nose with a steady hand, and let his head fall back against the pot's rim.

_Let's lay out the facts_, he thought to himself.

_One: Something still feels off about that banishment from Hell._

He had heard a few stories over the years of demons being permanently booted out of No-No Land, but these stories had never quite described the out-of-body chaos that had gone down a few days prior. Sure, they described a brief vessel disconnect and then it hurting; but the burning of hellfire turned against its own kin wasn't quite the same as the way he had perceived every disoriented sound and color rippling across his skin and every area of blank space or instant of silence as pain. That was weird, but whatever. Following the same vein-

_Two: I will not be returning to Hell. Ever. _

Part of him rejoiced. Yet at the same time, he felt somehow unfairly incomplete. He didn't care much for that feeling, so he quickly decided that was of no use to fret over it at this exact moment.

_Three: The apocalypse has been successfully avoided, and there is a bright new world waiting outside my door._

Oddly intimidating, but not necessarily in a bad way.

_And finally, _

_Four: Aziraphale... loves... me._

Crowley had expected the metaphorical package containing this statement to have some sort of doubt or worry tied onto it with coarse twine, and yet there was none. There was only an envelope laid on top, containing a tingly sort of warmth, a sensation gentle enough to let a moth perch on its finger but powerful enough to bring one to their knees. The feeling tugged a smile onto Crowley's face, but it was all rather a lot to take in at the moment so he placed the feeling in his pocket where it would be ready for him when the time came.

_Soon_, was the whisper emanating from deep in his own mind, the canopy surrounding him, and the entire rest of the flat.

Instead of continuing on with this train of thought, however, Crowley opted to pursue fact number three; seeing as it really was the most time-reliant of the three. The sun was rising on a universally fresh morning, and it surely couldn't hurt to peruse a bit of what the new dawn had to offer while he had the opportunity.

_Of course,_ he added as an afterthought, _it surely couldn't hurt to invite the angel along, too._


	4. Revelations

City dwellers flowed river-like past the brightly colored bookshop at the heart of London, as a man carrying a shallow crate approached in a teetering fashion. Aziraphale glanced down at the vibrant gaggle of potted plants that he held, already mapping out in his mind where each one would be placed in the shop. While the large, leafy, and generally monochrome green plants in Crowley's apartment were what had inspired him to buy his own, Aziraphale had opted for a multitude of tiny colorful cacti, flowers, and such. He was considering a purplish speckled one for the front windowsill as he turned to nudge the shop's door open with one shoulder, when the familiar sound of a roaring engine and screeching tires stopped him in his tracks. Something deep inside him twisted expectantly.

_Here we go again, in 3... 2... 1..._

The black Bentley careened haphazardly around a street corner before coming to an abrupt stop mere centimeters from the curb. Aziraphale tightened his grip on the crate of plants, the words "beautiful death trap" coming to mind, and not for the first time. The car's window rolled down, and Crowley propped his arm up on the ledge.

"Fancy meeting you here!" he called jovially.

"At this bookshop, where I live?" came Aziraphale's amused reply.

"Precisely. Anyway, I was thinking of having a little look around the brand new Earth, just because 'why not' and all that, and I thought you might want to come?"

This was exactly the sort of excuse for getting out of the book store for a while that Aziraphale had been in search of. He had been rather caught up in the excitement of getting it all back, but one doesn't realize how valuable fresh air is until they come to the conclusion that they've spent several days dwelling in a sea of dust. On top of that, Aziraphale could sense that every surface had been positively humming since the Almost Armageddon, like a constant harmonic reminder of how beautiful it must be out there.

"What a lovely proposition," Aziraphale answered with a grin. "Just let me drop these inside and I'll be right back out, lickety split!"

He ducked through the doorway and cleared off a section of one of the shop's tables, where he placed the plants. After a moment's consideration, the angel patted the smallest succulent on its uppermost leaf, almost as if for luck, before hurrying back outside and onto the sidewalk. Finally he rounded the car and dropped into the passenger seat.

"Where are we headed, then?"

The demon behind the wheel gave a good natured, yet slightly mischievous shrug.

"Doesn't matter much to me, I guess. Wherever the road takes us was the plan. There's always time to see a bit of Anywhere."

Aziraphale liked that idea quite a lot.

"The World it is, then?" He sighed.

Crowley tilted his head downwards so his glasses slid a ways down the bridge of his nose, golden eyes smiling gently into Aziraphale's own over the rims.

"It's no Alpha Centauri, but I think it'll do."

—

The car ride passed in a figurative and literal blur. Past stresses melted into the asphalt beneath the Bentley's wheels as two companions forgot all else and basked in good fortune and sunbeams streaming through windows.

A lilting conversation trickled from the subject of where the crate of plants had been acquired (there was a florist shop down the street a short ways, and although Aziraphale could have just miracled the plants into existence, it seemed more fun to do it the human-fashioned way), to popular nearby destinations that might be fun to visit; but it eventually dissolved into the pair repeatedly pointing out trees, houses, or other roadside artifacts and insisting that they had been different before the end of the world. Of course, the car was traveling much too fast for either of them to reasonably be able to make out much of anything, but that never served to damper their merriment.

Just as Aziraphale had taken some time, in fact was still taking time, to re-appreciate every intricacy of his shop, Crowley appeared to be doing the same with the Bentley. He kept fondly tapping his fingers across the steering wheel every time he accelerated and, to the angel's mild chagrin, every sharp turn was taken with about one quarter gallon more gusto than usual. However, likely with the help of a minor teleportational miracle, the city had long since begun to thin, and somehow the lack of crowded streets teeming with pedestrians allowed Aziraphale to be very-nearly-not-quite-perfectly at ease.

As the scenery further rid itself of signs of civilization, it began to seem as if every few yards, the side of the road offered its own unique vista. Of course, it was easy to find beauty in a world that was in the unique position of being both youthfully bright-eyed as well as wisened by centuries, but nowhere seemed quite right to stop.

"So we're both a bit restless, then?" Aziraphale ventured, after a thoughtful lull in conversation. Crowley considered for a moment before answering.

"Yeah, a little bit, now that you mention it. 6000 years of tempting and miracles, 10 years of apocalypse planning, a meeting with Satan himself and then it's all just... over. What do we even do after that?"

The pause that followed would have been pensive, had Crowley not abruptly swerved the car precariously late during yet another hairpin turn. Of course, the vehicle and its inhabitants remained unscathed, but Aziraphale gripped the edges of his seat tightly nonetheless. He was considering staying quiet for a bit in an attempt to salvage the contemplative atmosphere; however, something through the window caught his eye and he broke the silence by interjecting-

"Hold on, I know this place! The clearing beyond those trees; it's that park in the middle of nowhere from 18... no, 1915! The one with the pond, and the funny-shaped rock..." Aziraphale continued on with excited tidbits of description.

Crowley remembered the place vaguely, although his last visit to it had occurred long before the 1900s; in fact, long before it had been made into a public park at all. He and Aziraphale had, at some point in history, discovered that they both knew the location and had briefly considered it as a rendezvous spot.

"Seems as good a place as any," Crowley figured, and wrenched the wheel in the approximate direction of the road's shoulder.

After they had exited the car, a dew-dampened gravel path lead them to a rusted gate which protested just slightly, before being eased open beneath Crowley's hand. The demon couldn't quite recall the purpose of his previous visit, but the place was much the same as he remembered; a clearing in the forest that included a lake and some large stones, with the newer addition of the gate and some benches.

The two slowly approached the lake before Aziraphale began to hurry ahead, calling behind him-

"Everything's become bit more dilapidated since I was last here, but I seem to remember..." he ducked behind some trees.

"Crowley, come see!"

The demon quickened his pace to catch up, but stopped short when a breathtaking sight opened up before him. He had somehow failed to recollect that this park was actually a couple hundred kilometers out from London, allowing it to be backed right up to the ocean which was now stretching out beneath them after a steep cliff.

"Did you intend to miracle us out quite this far?" Aziraphale asked. "Because this place is perfect."

Crowley hadn't really intended to do any miracle-ing at all, and so came his muttered reply of, "It just sort of... happened."

They stood silently for some minutes, watching gentle waves surge across the shore before spanning out to meet the grey-misted sky. Although the pair had waited days to explore the freshly green Earth, it was clear that no part of it had gone stale. It was almost hypnotic in its vividness, yet also modest in its grandeur. This truly was a glorious place to revel in the joy of survival after strife.

Eventually and individually, both of their thoughts began to drift down the same tributary; approaching a sea of nearly identical ideas.

Aziraphale realized,

_Crowley and this Earth aren't too different, really, in a few respects._

Crowley happened upon the notion,

_And suddenly, I'm reminded of Aziraphale._

In unison,

_I can roam one planet, or have known this one person for six thousand years, but even now, they'll never cease to amaze me. _

It was a placidly comfortable moment in time, and it could have lasted for days had a sudden memory not shocked Crowley from the crown of his head through to the soles of his shoes. In an instant, he sprung from subdued to animated.

"Something isn't right here," he articulated, scanning the area in a serpentine fashion. Aziraphale raised an eyebrow questioningly.

"I hadn't even thought about it, but we're awfully close to one of the lesser-used gateways to Hell- That must be why I was here the first time. But I should be affected! No, actually, I should be _repelled_!"

Aziraphale took a step back as Crowley began taking experimental hops into the air, as if the springiness of the soil would reveal supernatural truths to him. Apparently it didn't, as his mouth quickly slid into a lopsided grimace.

"I've been exiled; that gateway and I should be like two magnets with the same polarity and yet-" he spun in a circle, arms thrown wide, "-Nada!"

"Well, maybe you haven't actually been locked out for good, then?" Aziraphale offered. Crowley didn't appear satisfied.

"If that's true, then why was I dancing the discorporation tango with death a few nights ago? I didn't do anything out of the ordinary." Orange-tinged eyebrows knit together. "Angel, did you?"

Aziraphale didn't hesitate in his reply.

"You barely left my side that whole evening."

Crowley's thoughts were speeding about in his brain, screeching around turns Bentley-style.

_Okay, let's assume it wasn't actually banishment from Hell._

_Well, _something_ almost killed me. _

_That means I might still be in danger. _

_Uh-oh. _

_Both of us might still be in danger. _

_That's worse. _

_That's much worse. _

"No, tell me right now," he insisted. "What exactly did you do that evening?"

Aziraphale's mouth quirked up on one side, but he spoke anyway.

"Well, we went and had a lovely time dining at the Ritz as you remember. Then we sort of ended up back at your place. We went inside, you wandered off, I saw the plants."

"What else?"

"I don't know Crowley, usual things! Then you got expelled from your vessel for a bit but you were alright so we went to sleep. I don't know what else to tell you, Dear." Aziraphale had actually intended the "Dear" at the end to be a "Dear Friend" or something along those lines, but it never quite made it all the way. Crowley scarcely batted an eye.

"It's almost as if I was poisoned with-" he began, but Aziraphale interrupted.

"Holy water!" he exclaimed suddenly. "I also cleaned up that holy water in the study." Then they both became very, very quiet.

Aziraphale looked at Crowley.

Crowley looked at Aziraphale.

"You don't think..."

It is a little known fact that the ingestion of holy water by a demon causes some rather different effects than if it were to simply come into contact with the skin. Just dropping into a tub of it would put one through agony, but take them quickly. Swallowing a drop of it in, say, a glass of wine would tear the demon from their vessel piece by piece, and take its sweet time. Crowley is aware of this. Aziraphale is not.

"No, not possible," The angel insisted. "Even with the tiniest dosage, you would most certainly have been killed!"

Aziraphale appeared to be so adamant about this point almost not because he didn't believe that this was what had happened, but because he so desperately didn't want Crowley to have gone through the pain that he knew must be included in the Near-Death via Holy Water package.

Meanwhile, Crowley didn't know exactly who might have had the intent of bringing about his death, but he _did_ know that he had enemies Upstairs, Downstairs, and just generally all over the place; he wouldn't exactly have been shocked to learn of an attempt on his life.

"That's correct; I would most certainly have been killed, that is, unless something got rid of any and all holy water in my system within a few hours of it having been slipped into my drink at dinner."

Aziraphale still appeared skeptical.

"After a couple hours, it could easily have done enough damage to disconnect me from my body," Crowley assured him. "But by that point it was already gone so, well, here I still am."

The only mystery left to solve was how, exactly, a tiny drop of holy water had disappeared into thin air. An idea that had gradually been occurring to Crowley over the course of minutes finally took shape in his mind.

"Angel," he continued softly. "exactly how much holy water did you miracle away?"

"Naturally, I did a sweep of the whole flat," Aziraphale replied matter-of-factly; although shortly after his gaze fell to the waves below, and his next sentence dropped a similar distance to a bashful mumble.

"I was worried that..."

Crowley's eyebrows raised expectantly.

"What was that, Angel?"

"I was worried that there might be a bit of residual water left on the thermos, and that it would burn your hands. Never mind, it's silly as it would have barely been a sunburn anyway but-"

Crowley placed a hand on the angel's shoulder, briefly silencing him.

"Aziraphale, look at me."

Icy grey-blue irises locked with those of molten gold through murky glass.

"You swept the whole flat. The flat that I was in, after having presumably taken a drink of holy water."

Following a day of many smiles, the one that Crowley and Aziraphale shared at that precise moment was by far the most relieved.

"I think you just saved my life for, what would this be, the third time this week?"


	5. After the Beginning

A persimmon sun trekked ever lower, the image of it nearing the horizon framed by the Bentley's rear windshield. The ocean had been left far behind, and it seemed almost as if the entire world belonged to one angel and one demon; continuing on towards London through thickets of trees and roads that cut across meadows. Cracked tarmac stretched out before them and they drove, slowed only by the hush of lengthening shadows.

"We should really be getting back soon," breathed Crowley, his voice barely more than another thread in the tapestry of silent darkness.

Aziraphale offered a slight nod of agreement.

"Do you want me to?"

"No, no. You saved my life, miracle-ing us home is the least I can do to thank you," Crowley replied. Nonetheless, Aziraphale gently insisted,

"Oh, now don't you go indebting yourself."

Crowley raised his hand, lightning fast, but Aziraphale was swifter; and with a snap of the angel's fingers, their surroundings shifted from woodland greenery to a drowsy heart of metropolis. The bookshop came into view, almost whimsically illuminated by street lamps and neon signs, and the car slowed to a gradual stop just ahead of its glass-paned front doors. Aziraphale stood, exited, and rounded the car to reach the sidewalk. The driver's side door was slightly ajar, but Crowley remained seated. Some of the elation left over from the day visibly drained from him as he asked,

"Is this... until the next time, then?"

Words unvoiced dappled a darkling sky like the stars that had yet to show their faces in the twilight, but now Aziraphale was unafraid to stargaze.

"Just come out here a moment… Please, I want to talk to you."

No pair of dark spectacles could hide the hope that rippled across the demon's features then. He closed the door behind him and stood beside his friend. They both looked out at the setting sun for a moment, buildings on either side forming a proscenium arch around the fiery hues fading to indigo. Crowley pulled the sunglasses from his face, with no need to shield his eyes from a deserted street, nor such an awe-inspiring sight.

"Crowley," whispered Aziraphale. "There's something we need to talk about and I think we both know what it is."

Crowley broke his gaze from the sunset to find that the angel was already gazing over at him.

"Look," he continued. "What I said, I definitely meant it."

Crowley inhaled sharply.

"When you said that you... loved me?"

He nodded, causing the demon's heart to race.

"Crowley, you are my closest; if we're being honest, my _only_ friend in the history of creation. And as I'm sure you've seen, come actual Hell itself or high water, I care about you-"

_No, no, friendship, love, how could I have misinterpreted, idiot, idiot, id-_

Aziraphale reached across the expanse between them and took Crowley's hand in his own, silencing his worries.

"-But there's another... way that I feel. I told myself, for years, that our respective sides would never let us... so I tried to pretend that feeling wasn't there. But as soon as I thought I had lost you, I realized that I'd never imagined eternity without you by my side."

The words cascaded out onto the pavement, and the angel breathed a visible sigh of relief once he had said them; but he continued-

"So in that other way, I absolutely love you as well." Aziraphale paused, his eyes taking on a hint of pleading as they met Crowley's. "I _absolutely_ love you, and I can only hope that you feel..."

His voice was beginning to develop fissures at its edges.

"…the same..."

Crowley stepped closer and filled the gap left by the dissipated sentence.

"Angel, may I kiss you?"

They were both leaned so close now that Crowley's voice tickled Aziraphale's nose, the fingers of his right hand intertwined with those belonging to the most beautiful being he had ever encountered.

"Absolutely," Aziraphale repeated for a third and final time, doubt a fleeting dream left behind long ago.

And so, they did.

As Crowley's lips met Aziraphale's, it was almost as if the two auras arching up behind them became one. Outstretched tendrils of energy, gold tinged azure and black reflecting crimson in the twilight, permeated the evening air and gradually interlaced overhead.

It was the most sacred yet unholy partnership ever beheld by the universe's wise old eyes.

Crowley's free hand, although still clutching the glasses, found its way to Aziraphale's back, and he tenderly pulled him a fraction of an inch closer. Aziraphale, in turn, deepened the kiss.

And then, in a flurry of cascading sparks, every lamp on the street flared once; miniature thunderclaps ringing out as each bulb exploded, releasing shards of glass like crystalline snowfall. In an instant, the lamps dimmed from inferno to onyx, enveloping the two souls in the pleasantly wistful darkness and silence that is so rarely found in an eternally restless city such as this.

The angel's gaze flickered to the shattered lamps and he sputtered,

"I-I'm sorry-"

But Crowley only murmured,

"My Love, don't you dare apologize."

They broke apart by an almost imperceptible degree, as Crowley could not help but let out a giddy laugh into the soft skin at the corner of Aziraphale's mouth. A tingling warmth was falling across him yet again, and he had a feeling that the angel was experiencing the same.

Before long, they were both giggling uncontrollably, tossing sounds of only the highest caliber mirth into the newly star-speckled sky. There they stood on the street corner, lingering in embrace with their foreheads leaned together, laughing and maybe crying too, because after all they had been through, the world continued to turn. They laughed because they were free, there were bright days on the horizon, and because the power of simple kindness was stronger than death itself trying to pull them apart. But most of all, they laughed because Crowley had finally kissed Aziraphale and Aziraphale had finally kissed Crowley, and their combined, unchecked, purely adoring occult energy had blown out every single streetlamp in sight. Really, after 6,000 years, could they have hoped for anything less spectacular?

Above their heads, night had fallen.

The moon smiled down from her throne in the sky.

After some time, an angel led a demon indoors by the hand, offering shelter from the New Earth's first rain…

And finally, a nightingale slept peacefully, high in a bookstore's eaves.

…


End file.
